There is a hum and my phone skitters an inch or so across the table, bumping into a pastel yellow beachhouse perched on wooden stilts above a vista of scenic rolling dunes.

It’s Marc, asking if I’m down for brunch tomorrow with his cousin who’s in town for a music festival.

With a sigh, I text back to say I can’t afford to keep going to brunch in the middle of the week, by means of the waffle, dollar sign, and sad face emojis

Dear Mr. Loaf,

Can I call you Meat? I’m writing because we share an affinity for renaming ourselves as grub. You were once Marvin and became so much more. Likewise, I want the culinary glory of nomenclature from foodstuffs.

A melee broke out early this morning at a coffee shop in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn between those waiting in line to order their tall, grandes and ventis and the steady stream of customers who ordered online and sauntered past them to grab their waiting drinks.

Item 151. Perhaps the most important literary correspondence we’ve ever offered: an unrecorded handwritten letter from Herman Melville to G.P. (George) Putnam, publisher of Melville’s first novel (Typee) and several of his short stories. This letter doesn’t appear in The New Melville Log or Correspondence, but its provenance is an unbroken chain, and the handwriting unquestioned. All pages have minor foxing; a few unobtrusive tears on page two; one coffee-ring stain on page one partially obscuring the date; several large (including one full-page) blue-pencil question marks scattered throughout. Important, compelling, and rare.

There can be little doubt that poets do not contribute greatly to society. Their work, produced in vast abundance, is nearly valueless to our species. Indeed, the great bulk of their efforts are simply given away; the poems cannot be sold. Yet, I believe that poets are capable of contributing meaningfully to the human endeavor and I propose the following ways in which we may put poets to use.